The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1887-12-16
PROCESS OF CANE PLANTING.
Methods Pursued ON Louisiana PIanta-
tion-Worlk In the StubbIe Fields.


Methods Pursued ON Louisiana PIants-
homework In the stubbIe Fields.
Let us follow In their sequence the
processes OF planting. First is tho I'M
covering with plows of the burrows in
which the seed cane has been buried
since last fall, tho pulling it out of the
ground with great iron hooks attached to
poles, and the loading it into carts. In
the "hooking up" gang observed two
white men working with the negroes.
They are Spaniards from tho Terre aux
Boufs country, the other side of the
swamps. There are two others who are
neither whites nor negroes. They have
q brown complexion, high cheek bones,
regular features and straight black hair
These are "Manilla men"-natives of the
Philippine Islands. The curiously mixed
population of lower Louisiana includes
5000 or 5000 of them.
Big, stout carts, with broad tired
wheels, haul the resurrected canes to the
field prepared for planting. Here gang
OF women called choppers" take up the
canes by armfuls and drop them in heaps
Mt intervals beside the burrows. They are
placed in the burrows by other women
called "planters. Another gang passes
along the burrows and chops up the canes
with rude Ratchet like knives. The OBJ
ject of this is to give the weak eyes
chance to draw strength from tho stock
which would otherwise be absorbed by
those which have already a good start.
About six tons Of cane go to the planting
OF an acre. One acre of seed cane will
plant three acres, and as the planting
must be done every third year, one-ninth
OF the crop average Of aplantation must
but be given up to seed cane. When the
seed cane is cut in the fall the stalks arc
laid between the rows Of stubble and
covered with q pillow run on each side.
After the canes are laid and cut, they
are covered with plows or with a ma
chine called rotary hoe, and the ground
is then rolled to press the dirt close to the
sprouting eyes, The first crop is called
plant cane. Next gear the cane sprouts
from the stubble. and il called first
ratoons. The second year it sprouts
again. and is called second ratoons. The
third year the stubble Is plowed up and
the ground sowed with field peas, which
recuperates the land, as clover does
northern farms. The fourth year it is
again put in plant cane. A good yield
to the acre is 25 tons Of plant cane, 20
of the first ratoons, and u of second
ratoons. On the upper coast, above
New Orleans, it is customary to let the
stubble ration but once. In Cuba it often
ratoons six successive years. but the cane
becomes constantly more woody and
poorer in saccharine matter.
In the stubble fields the first spring,
work consists in "barring off," or NOV
ing the dirt away from the roots of the
cane with plows and hoes, TO permit the
light and air to hasten the terminating Of
the ratoons. By the middle of April
there should he good stand of tho
young sprouts. Then the dirt is worked
back toward the rows, end there is con-
slant cultivation with the plow till after
the let of July, when tho crop is "laid
by" No more work is done on it till the
cutting begins in September. Now tho
cane is so high that q man drivinga mule
is lost to sight between the rows. Soon
it will be tall enough to swallow up o
man on horseback. The rows are usual
ly seven feet apart and always run paral-
lei with the ditches-that is, from the
river or bayou Inward the swamp. July
and August was formerly the time for
cutting wood in the swamps to run the
sugar mill during the grinding season,
but now most plantations burn coal. The
crop being "made," the planter feels
that he can relax his vigilance, and if he
has the means, he goes off to the north
with his family to escape the two hottest
months of the year in Louisiana and
build up his health in a less enervating
climate. e. V. Smalley in The Century.